"Just around a little, Ginny." He brushed his mustache back and forth. "I just had a little idea."
"Your little ideas I know," said Virginia. Grace grinned at her and picked up the phone. When he got hold of Robert Buford in Thousand Oaks, he said after identifying himself, "I hope you’re feeling better, Mr. Buford."
"Well, I suppose. It’s over. That is, the funeral’s tomorrow, we had to wait till your office released the body."
Grace didn’t bother to correct that to the coroner’s office. "I’ve got a funny sort of question for you, Mr. Buford. Did your brother like to play cards? Gamble a little now and then?"
"That is a funny one, Mr. Grace. Well, he used to. He used to be quite a man for that, years back. But Mary, his wife, she disapproved of it and he hadn’t for a long while. Tell you something funny, Mr. Grace-when I couldn’t get hold of him, it just crossed my mind to wonder if maybe he’d gone down to Gardena, one of the gambling houses, to sort of pass the time. He was at loose ends, and since Mary was gone-but I don’t think he would have, at that. He’d got out of the habit."
"I see. That’s interesting," said Grace.
"You found out anything about who killed him yet?"
"Not yet, but I may have a little lead," said Grace.
"Thanks, Mr. Buford… Ginny, I’m off. I’ll be back sometime." She just gave him an exasperated look. He dropped the film off at the drugstore and went on downtown, to Virgil Avenue. It was just one-thirty. Ben’s Bar and Grill was open. The little idea might be nothing at all, but in Grace’s experience you had to, as the song said, accentuate the positive to get any results. It was said that if you sent a telegram saying All is discovered to any ten people at random, nine of them would pack bags and start running. He believed it.
He walked into the place and went up to the bar. The owner, fat bald Charles Reinke, was alone here: no customers yet. He recognized Grace with a nod, obviously remembering the badge in his hand before. "Do for you?" he asked unwillingly.
"Oh, Scotch," said Grace. "Straight up. By the way, why’s it called Ben’s? Your name is Charles."
Reinke looked even more wary at the implication that Grace had been checking into him. "Uh, it was named that when I bought it," he said. "It’d been here awhile, I just didn’t bother to change the name."
"Sounds sensible," said Grace, and sipped Scotch.
"But you know something, Mr. Reinke. I don’t need to tell you that the state examiners are pretty damn choosy who they sell liquor licenses to. You could lose yours right away quick if they got to hear you’re running illegal card games here."
"Oh, hell and damnation," said Reinke. "Hell and damnation. I knew it-I knew it’d get around, those God-damned fools- It wasn’t my fault! I didn’t want any part of it! I told them to go away somewhere else, I told them about my license, listen, this place is all I got, I just barely make it now, I got to keep my nose clean if I-I told them!"
He was nearly wringing his hands; he looked at Grace anxiously. "How did you hear about it? Have you-have you-"
"Called up the board and said come grab your license quick? No, Mr. Reinke." Grace hadn’t anticipated this reaction; from what Galeano had said, he’d rather expected the quiet game in a back room with a cut to the house.
"I don’t think the regulations are just very realistic myself."
It was a human instinct, gambling. Reinke’s fat face looked somewhat less miserable.
"Neither do I-I don’t know your name." Grace told him. "-Mr. Grace. But there they are-and I get caught with customers playing for money, I’m dead. Look, it was only the once, see. I asked them to go somewhere else, I told them, but Sam-he just laughed and said I shouldn’t worry so much. I couldn’t do nothing about it, because-"
He hesitated.
"Good customers?" suggested Grace, letting him take his time.
"Well, yeah, but also-I might as well say, as long as I got to tell about it-also, I owe Sam some money. I got in a bind last summer when my wife was sick, we don’t have any insurance, and Sam loaned me a thousand. I been payin’ it back as I can, but he’s been a damn good friend to me, he’s a nice guy and I just didn’t like to press it, he brought out the cards. Honest, it was only the one time and I’ll see it don’t happen again."
"Al1 right," said Grace casually. "When was it? Was Dick Buford in on it?"
"Yeah," said Reinke, passing a hand across his mouth.
"Yeah. That was another reason I felt kind of nervous, you coming before, asking. I suppose it was just a coincidence, him getting clobbered by some thug just after, but--"
"That night? Last Tuesday, a week ago today?"
"Well, no," said Reinke. "No, it got started on Monday afternoon. They just got to playing and sort of kept on. It was draw poker."
"Mmh-hm," said Grace. "Who was in the game?"
"Well, Sam-Sam McAllister, he lives down the block on Fifth. He started it, and the Colombos-Rudy and Vic Colombo, they own the garage across the street, got a couple reliable hands so they could take the time off. And Andy Bond, he’s a regular too, a retired guy like Sam. There was another guy, I’m not sure of his name, he works at the men’s store across the street, but he was only in the game awhile, said he had to get back to work. Then Buford dropped in, late Monday afternoon, and got in it. I asked ’em to go away, they could go to Sam’s, but Sam said his wife’d kill him if she come back, find the place in a mess-I guess she was away somewheres--and they were comfortable here, everything to hand like, and I shouldn’t worry. I could just go home, he said, he’d keep count of any drinks they had and sandwiches and all, and if they got tired they’d lock up. But they didn’t," said Reinke. "They was all still there Tuesday, all Tuesday, and I was wild, I tell you."
Grace marveled slightly, no gambler himself, but he knew such sessions did go on. "Sam’s nephew was with them then," said Reinke, "young sailor, he was on leave, stayin’ with Sam. Yeah, Buford was still in too."
"When did it break up?"
"Along about seven that night. I told them they had to go away, I didn’t like it. And I guess by then they were getting tired, no wonder, even if one or the other’d drop out awhile and lie down in my back room. They finally broke it up and went."
"Would you happen to know who came out ahead?" asked Grace. "They playing very high stakes?"
"I don’t think so, but it went on so long- Yeah, Buford and Andy took kind of a bundle, I guess. I remember this sailor sayin’ they’d got most of his shore-leave money, and Sam said maybe he’d got some education for it, better than spending it on girls."
"They all left about the same time?"
"About. I was damn glad to see them go, and I made up my mind, Sam try that again, it’s no go-I’ll put my foot down. Mr. Grace, you aren’t going to do anything about it, are you?"
"Not to you," said Grace, finishing his Scotch.
The sergeant at Pendleton had been very helpful, but Hackett was tired of this damned job. He and Higgins had by now come across several military personnel stationed at Pendleton who hailed from California, but nowhere near L.A.
"And that," said Higgins finally with a long sigh, "is that. Finis. If it was a hunch, it was a dud, and damn Scarne and S.I.D. We might better have asked Luis to consult his crystal ball."
"Probably." Hackett lit a cigarette and flipped over the sheets on his desk. "Oh, damn-here’s one we missed, George. The AWOL’s. But it’s short and sweet- And isn’t that a coincidence?" he added suddenly. "Don’t speak too soon. Here’s an enlisted man, Leo Mullarkey, AWOL last month. His home address is on Magnolia, just a block away from Faber’s Market."
"And I suppose he made for it right off," said Higgins, "the first place they’d look for him."
"People do stupid things or we wouldn’t have such a good reputation," said Hackett.